Her headstone records that it was erected by her mother and brothers with the inscription:
‘If he asked us well we know
We would cry oh spare this blow
Yes with streaming tears would
say
Lord we love her let her stay’
Lily May was the daughter of Walter and Lillian Deborah Simmonds (nee O’Conner) who were married in New Zealand in 1878. Lily had two older brothers who were Gerald Walter (born 1879) and Horace Richard born in 1881. Lily was born in 1884 (registered as Lillian May). The family lived in Napier.
On 17th May 1887, the steamer ‘Sir Donald’ departed from Gisborne. Walter was the engineer on board. It was later supposed that the vessel was driven northwards by a gale and that the captain steered for Nick’s Head for shelter and struck one of the long reefs there. It sank and all lives were lost. The wreckage which was washed ashore confirmed the identity of the vessel.
Also in 1887 Walter’s wife Lillian gave birth to a daughter named Beatrice Walterina. Beatrice died aged 10 months.
In 1891, Lillian remarried to Charlie Kelly. Their son Stanley Archibald Campbell Kelly was born in 1892.
We cannot determine when Charlie Kelly died or when Lillian moved to Wellington. Lily May died on 13th September 1900 at Lorne Street, Wellington. She was 16 years old. Her funeral notice advised that the funeral departed from 3 Devon Street, the home of Mrs Watson, at 2:30pm on 15th September for the Karori Cemetery.
In 1901, Lillian married for a third time to David Francis Perry who was a coach trimmer. David died in 1903 (plot Plot: *ROM CATH/F/19).
Lillian died 1913 at her son Horace’s house in Ngaio. She was 51 years old.
Plot: *Ch Eng/M/40
By Julia Kennedy
